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Paul Craig Roberts
Institute for Political Economy
PCR Interviewed by pravda.ru about the attempt by the Advanced Placement History Curriculum to introduce some honesty into the teaching of US history
PCR Interviewed by pravda.ru about the attempt by the Advanced Placement History Curriculum to introduce some honesty into the teaching of US history
The tendency of US history textbooks is to justify any US atrocity from the point of view of the defense of US interests. “Exceptional” America is exempt from laws of morality applied to other countries.
Republicans are attempting to prevent the introduction of the Advanced Placement curriculum until the textbook can be “revised” in order to ensure that students are propagandized rather than informed.
The editors of pravda.ru asked PCR for his view of the matter. This is what he said:
“In my opinion, the Republican Party today and a majority of Americans who think of themselves as conservatives are not, in fact, traditional American conservatives. They comprise a form of brownshirts who are intolerant of dissent and want to impose social control. They support government instead of the Constitution, and they frown on civil liberty as a form of legal permissiveness that coddles criminals and terrorists.
“These so-called conservatives attribute the US defeat in Vietnam to student protests and to journalists who disputed Washington’s lies. They regard protests as a threat to the status quo, and not as a way to express public dissent from government policies. Conservatives are for democracy only as long as they control behavior in the democracy.
“In the 1940s and 1950s public school courses such as history and literature were largely up to the individual teacher. Consequently, there was a lot of diversity in what was taught. As time passed, especially after the 1964 Civil Rights Act and school integration, courses became increasingly standardized, partly in order to judge school performance with standardized state or national testing, and partly, according to some, to ensure that minorities were not offended by course content. The obvious consequence is that a form of national brainwashing was put in place that instilled in the young acceptable beliefs about their country.
“For the so-called conservatives, any criticism of America is an unpatriotic act. In the 21st century it has become increasingly difficult to protest in the US. The former Director of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, declared that the new department had shifted its focus from terrorists to “domestic extremists,” a group she defined as war protesters, environmentalists, and animal rights advocates. Indeed, a national police force called Homeland Security itself indicates an increasing concern with protecting those in control from dissent.
“The increasing gratuitous violence of police against members of the public is also an indication that there has been a fundamental shift in the position of the government in relation to the people. The purpose of government in the US is not to serve the will of the people, but to conform the behavior of the people to the will of the government.
“The same thing appears to be the case in Australia, Canada, the UK, and Europe. For example, in the UK, 99% of the people are opposed to fracking, but the government has ignored the people and permits fracking to take place under the homes of people without their consent.
“In the West, I think that the idea of democracy is dead. Democracy is no longer a respected value. Elections serve as a cloak to mask the death of democracy.”
http://english.pravda.ru/world/americas/01-10-2014/128658-american_history_exceptionalism-0/